Origins As early as 1949 the cartoonist
H. M. Bateman had called for the founding of a national museum of cartoons.
Little Russell Street location (2006–2018) The Cartoon Museum first opened its doors on 23 February
2006 in Little Russell St, Fitzrovia, in Central London, following a £750,000 fundraising campaign led by cartoonist and
Cartoon Art Trust chairman
Oliver Preston. The museum was opened by
The Duke of Edinburgh, who was patron of the Cartoon Art Trust for over 20 years, and had himself attended Bateman's talk at the
Royal College of Art in 1949. The Duke "saw humour in everything". Director/Curator Anita O'Brien noted: "There has never been a cartoon museum [in Britain]... In spite of the very strong historical tradition here, there has always been a very strong ambivalence towards comic art." CAT chairman Oliver Preston stated that "Cartoons are art ...[but] they have never been treated as art and it's about time these cartoonists had a home where people could see their work". The museum attracted 26,000 visitors a year the Cartoon Museum reopened in new, larger premises at 63 Wells Street, north of Oxford Street, on 1 July 2019, on a long-term lease in a new development with a
peppercorn rent. The space was designed by Sam Jacob Studio. One of the first exhibitions was titled
"Comic Creators: The Famous and the Forgotten", featuring classic cartoons such as
Billy Bunter,
Jonah,
Desperate Dan,
Dennis the Menace and
Judge Dredd. The collection spans 300 years of cartoons, beginning with the
Georgian "
Golden Age of Caricature", including
James Gillray and
George Cruikshank. In the early Eighteenth century British travellers to Europe on the
Grand Tour brought back Italian
caricatura, introducing polite society to the new art form. and modern satirists such as
Gerald Scarfe and
Ralph Steadman. In June 2021 the museum re-opened after the
COVID-19 lockdown with an exhibition of the art of
V for Vendetta titled "
Behind the Mask". In September 2021 The Cartoon Museum exhibited
"Hidden Treasures", three previously unknown works by
Ralph Steadman. In 2021 the Cartoon Museum was "highly commended" by the Museums and Heritage Awards for "Fundraisers of the Year". In November 2021 the museum opened "
The Laughter Lab", an exhibition dedicated to exploring the science behind laughter, in association with evolutionary biologist
Robin Dunbar. ==Exhibitions==